The Apollo 11 exhibit is the next big national tour you need to catch
Space and science nerds, rejoice!
A monumental piece of space exploration history — the Apollo 11 capsule — is soon launching a national tour, giving you a chance to get an up-close view of the spacecraft used in the first lunar landing.
The Columbia capsule, which took Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins on a nearly million-mile journey to the moon and back, is the centerpiece of the upcoming Destination Moon: The Apollo 11 Mission tour of four museums across the country to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the moon landing in 2019.
The tour, developed by the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service (SITES), features the module and more than 20 other objects, as well as an interactive 3D tour that allows visitors to get a view inside the Columbia.
If there's one downside, it's that the exhibition is only going to four museums — but there's plenty of time to plan a trip. Besides, this is the first time Columbia has left the National Air and Space Museum since it opened in 1976 (the capsule previously did a 50-state tour in 1970 and 1971).
Here's where the tour is stopping:
Space Center Houston, Houston, Texas: Oct. 14, 2017 – March 18, 2018
Saint Louis Science Center, St. Louis, Missouri: April 14 – Sept. 3, 2018
Senator John Heinz History Center, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: Sept. 29, 2018 – Feb. 18, 2019
The Museum of Flight, Seattle, Washington: March 16 – Sept. 2, 2019
The 50th anniversary of the first moon landing is July 20, 2019, in case you want to really time your visit to the exhibit with the big event.
Marcus Gilmer is Mashable's Assistant Real-Times News Editor on the West Coast, reporting on breaking news from his location in San Francisco. An Alabama native, Marcus earned his BA from Birmingham-Southern College and his MFA in Communications from the University of New Orleans. Marcus has previously worked for Chicagoist, The A.V. Club, the Chicago Sun-Times and the San Francisco Chronicle.
